


Dressed in a Daydream

by norgbelulah



Category: British Actor RPF, Taylor Swift (Musician)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Magic, F/M, Lovesickness, Mind Manipulation
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-07-28
Updated: 2016-07-28
Packaged: 2018-07-27 05:30:43
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,959
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7605442
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/norgbelulah/pseuds/norgbelulah
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>“You and Taylor,” Ryan said. Tom had met Ryan before, but right now he couldn’t think of where. A party or premiere, he imagined. “After the Met, right? Just seems fast, is all. You guys jumped right in. With all the photos and...yeah.”</p>
<p>Tom frowned. He couldn’t think of how else they might have done it. “We’re in love,” he said simply.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Dressed in a Daydream

“It’s been a whirlwind, huh?”

Tom blinked the sun out of his eyes. He focused on Ryan Reynolds’ handsome face. He and Blake must have arrived… he wasn’t sure when. He wondered how long they’d been speaking.

“What has?” Tom asked. His eyes kept wandering to the shore. He enjoyed watching the waves lap at Taylor’s rough, almost cobblestoned beach.

“You and Taylor,” Ryan said. Tom had met Ryan before, but right now he couldn’t think of where. A party or premiere, he imagined. “After the Met, right? Just seems fast, is all. You guys jumped right in. With all the photos and...yeah.”

Tom frowned. He couldn’t think of how else they might have done it. “We’re in love,” he said simply.

Ryan looked a bit worried he’d offended Tom, so Tom smiled at him and winked. That usually fixed the strange glances people seemed to be giving him lately. Though it hadn’t helped with his mother, until Taylor spoke to her. Then everything was just fine.

There came a bang and a fizzing noise as Taylor chased after one of the dancers from the tour yelling about no sparklers in her house. Tom froze, startled, and Ryan shot him another worried glance.

“There certainly are a lot of people here now,” Tom said. He hoped it was an innocent enough observation, though he was feeling rather apprehensive about it regardless.

Ryan shrugged. “It’s the Fourth, man. Americans, right?” At Tom’s blank look, he added, “The Fourth of July. Independence Day...from England.”

“Y-yes, of course.” Tom looked back at the shoreline. The waves came in steady and strong.

“Taylor must’ve warned you about her giant parties for the Fourth. Blake says she can’t talk about anything else for months.”

She had. She had told him. 

“Yes, I--” he couldn’t think of a logical reason for him to have forgotten. And it was clear that he had. 

“Tom!” She called to him from the rocks that wound down to the beach below. She called again.

“Excuse me,” he said and went to her. She held her arms out to him.

 

Tom looked down into his drawer of shirts. His drawer here at Taylor's house, which she herself had unpacked for him. He vaguely remembered making noises that he had a new project coming up soon. He wouldn't be staying long enough to unpack. But that felt like ages ago. So she must have been right.

Taylor said the party was moving to the beach. That was good, but Tom wasn't sure he wanted to swim. He thought he might wear a polo. A blue one. Taylor said he looked good in blue. He had three blue shirts; a light blue with thin dark blue stripes, a solid navy blue, and a grey-blue that reminded Tom of Taylor’s ocean. He stared at them, unable to decide.

His eye caught on a canary, sunshine yellow shirt tucked in the corner of the drawer. He thought of Taylor’s dress in Italy. Taylor said she loved this color. His hand hovered over it.

“Tom.” Her voice came as if out of a wind tunnel. Had she been calling him long?

He looked up at her and smiled. She looked lovely in a bright red bathing suit that was more athletic than revealing. She wore no makeup, but was still luminous and vibrant. She almost blinded him.

“What are you doing?” Taylor asked, tilting her head slightly to the left. Perhaps she thought she might understand better if she looked from a different angle. 

“I didn’t know if I would swim. I was trying to decide on a shirt.” Words poured out of him when he looked at her. He couldn’t quite remember how to lie.

She smiled as though he were being silly. “Of course you’ll swim,” she said. “And don’t worry about any of those. Look what I made for you.” 

She held up a white cotton tank. On it was painted the words, _I ❤ T.S._. Tom stared at it. Unsure how to voice a protest. Unwilling to think hard enough about it.

“Don’t you just love it?” She asked, glee suffusing her voice. Her eyes lit up as she thrust the shirt at him.

Tom grinned as he took it from her. “Yeah,” he said. “It’s fucking amazing.” He slipped it quickly over his head and pulled it down enthusiastically. He didn’t know why he’d been reluctant before. It didn’t matter anyway. “I love it.”

Taylor laughed. “People will get a kick out of it, right? It’s nice to fuck with the photographers sometimes, you know?”

Tom wasn’t sure, but he smiled and nodded. He slid the hemmed edge of the shirt through his fingers, feeling the weight of it, the love and truth in the gift. It warmed him more than the sun ever could.

“I love you,” he said. That was important. She said he should tell her so, a lot.

“Great,” she replied and kissed his cheek. “Let’s go.”

 

After the beach and the water slide, Tom went back to his room to change again. 

Before he left her side, Taylor reached out to touch his cheek. He thought she might kiss him, since there were so many people around. But she only thumbed his cheekbone and said lightly, “It’ll cool down soon. Wear the red and blue striped button-down, okay?”

Tom smiled, feeling relieved.

He showered quickly, washing the ocean away. And changed without thought.

When he came back down everyone else had changed as well, as though on a particular schedule. They were out on the porch and in the grass.

Taylor was sitting with Blake and another girl on the porch. A man asked him, “Do you want a drink?” Tom couldn’t remember if they’d been introduced. He didn’t look like an actor or a dancer or a model.

Tom would like a drink, he thought. Before he could speak, Taylor said, “Oh, bring me one?”

“Of course, darling,” he said and turned to the man. “I’ll go with you.”

The caterers were all outside, but some white wine had been left to chill in the kitchen. 

The man spoke as he pulled some glasses from a cabinet. “She moved fast on you, huh?” he said lightly. 

He seemed to know where to find the glasses and a bottle opener. Tom had always been handed things to eat or drink in this house. As far as he could recall, anyway. 

“Oh, I don’t know,” Tom replied in the same tone as the man. Truly, he wasn’t sure anymore that she hadn’t, as he’d protested to Ryan. 

The man smiled like he felt he knew something Tom didn’t. “She’s got a special kind of magic.”

Tom’s vision narrowed and blurred. The words had struck him, But in a scant moment, he was no longer sure what had been said. The memory slipped through his scrambling grasp.

“S-say that again,” he gasped.

The man looked shocked and then guilty. He met Tom’s eyes then glanced away quickly. “Nothing, man. I didn’t--I mean--”

Tom stared at him, mystified and impatient. He didn’t care what had been said anymore. Why were they even speaking like this? As though they were friends. “Who are you?”

His eyes widened in an almost comical _oh, shit_ expression and said, “Tom, I’m Ben Lamanna. Britany’s husband? We met yesterday? I’ve been here all day…”

Tom took a step away from him. He blinked slowly, and carefully thought of nothing at all. 

“What’s taking so long?” Taylor called happily through the open french doors to the porch. 

Tom took the glass of wine Ben had already poured and turned on his heel. He walked calmly back to her.

Her happy expression fell when he presented her with a single glass. “None for you?” she asked.

He blinked and frowned. Something niggled at him. 

“Your own personal manservant,” another blonde woman sitting on the other side of Ryan and Blake joked with a smile. Ben came out from the kitchen and handed her a glass of wine. Of course, this was his wife Britany, Taylor’s best friend.

“If I wanted one of those, I’d have one,” Taylor grumped, pouting attractively.

Tom felt at sea. Perhaps he should go back and get another glass. Why hadn’t he come back with two? Ben was watching him with a sharp-eyed stare. 

Taylor’s expression transformed in a flash. She grabbed at his limp hand and said, “It’s all right. We’ll just share, baby.” She stood to kiss his cheek and somehow maneuvered him into the chair she’d been sitting in and then herself into his lap. 

He took a deep draught from the glass. She watched him with warm eyes until he knew she wanted him to kiss her. So he did.

 

Later, someone handed Tom a glass of whiskey. There was dancing and more sparklers and more food and another few glasses of whiskey or wine. Taylor was with him and then she wasn’t and suddenly Tom wasn’t sure of anything.

He knew where he was, but he couldn’t quite remember how he’d gotten there. They’d danced at the Met Gala and they’d flown around the world, but it had all merged into a blur of bright skies and Taylor’s face. What had she done to him? Had she done anything? Was he losing his mind?

He stumbled down to the beach. The waves somehow called to him, the only thing he could focus on for long. He felt a stretch, the thinning of a tether between something in his chest and another thing, a stronger thing, that he’d left somewhere in the house on the hill behind him.

He took off his shoes and stepped into the surf. The water rushed around his feet, stinging his skin with cold and cooling the fever in his mind.

“Christ,” he breathed. He drained his glass and gazed into the horizon.

Still later, she found him.

He knew she was there as soon as she came. He’d felt her coming and been glad and afraid. When she spoke, her voice felt as cool as the sea and just as soothing. “Do you feel drunk?”

“No,” he said. He turned to her. In the darkness that had fallen while he stood there, her face was obscured. “I can hardly feel anything. Except when I look at you. Isn't that strange?”

She shrugged. She’d applied a dark lipstick at some point and he could see her lips quirk. She was amused by him. “Maybe that's what love feels like,” she said.

Tom lifted his face to the night sky. “Do you feel this way too?”

There was suppressed laughter in her voice. He didn’t think she was taunting him, but it felt that way. “I meant for you. Loving me.” She paused and sobered. “Do you want to stop?”

Tom felt suddenly that he’d forgotten want. He thought of the shirts in his drawer that morning. He thought of the comfort of her choice, of her gifts. 

He wondered idly then how he would work. Feeling things was...important. He turned back to her suddenly unsure again.

Her eyes were the color of the sea. Her smile warmed him again. She said, “It won't feel the same when we're apart.”

He didn’t ask her how she knew that. He wasn't sure if it was much of a comfort.

“Will you come in?” She asked.

The words were in his mouth. They were not hard to find. So he said them. “I love you.”

“So come in now, baby.”

Tom smiled. He shook his head and it cleared. He looked around sheepishly, “I've been standing here a while now, haven't I?”

She held out her hand and he took it.

**Author's Note:**

> I know so little about Taylor Swift's life, but I wrote this stupid thing anyway. It's mostly based off the Vox.com article that I read explaining Hiddleswift, which was delightful.
> 
> I hope you enjoyed.


End file.
